


Phangst: Cathartic Cleansing

by ShadesOfGrey



Category: Purple Hyacinth - Ephemerys & Sophism (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst, Death, Extremely Dark, F/M, Grimdark, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, I Made Myself Cry, I wanna edit but I Can't, I'm Bad At Tagging, I'm Sorry, Murder, Why Do I Have So Many Typos, why are you still reading these
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-29
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:54:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26707048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadesOfGrey/pseuds/ShadesOfGrey
Summary: Anguished Assassin™Kieran White struggles to speak to the only faced (and human) being in his life. Even though Lauren's the burning, waterproof candle in his cold darkness, it seems she puts herself out just as he feels her warmth.
Relationships: Lauren Sinclair/Kieran White
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22





	Phangst: Cathartic Cleansing

**Author's Note:**

> TW: War crimes (waterboarding, water torture in general), death + murder, injury on self/others, suicide.  
> Disclaimer: Strong angst. Proceed w/ caution.  
> 
> 
> (wow, I have a lot of grimdark in my fics, hmm... I wonder if that says something about me?)  
> (does it cancel out if sometimes I feel bad after reading what I wrote?)

“You incompetent fool!”

Pyrethrum had shouted those words before, and shouted them now. Their hand flew across Kieran White’s face, with enough force to shock him. 

“One job!” the being shrieked. Kieran lowered his head, ashamed, yet he had a guilty pleasure that he’d defied them. “You’re begging to be whipped.”

“Then whip me,” Kieran replied stalely, emotionlessly. He’d been whipped before. He wasn’t afraid; fear would be something to stray far, far away.

Pyrethrum, obviously, was displeased by this lack of response. They scowled and backed up, crossing their arms firmly. “Explain yourself. No, explain your job. Your task. And then explain to me what you did wrong. Stare me in the face. I want to see your pathetic eyes.”

And so, Kieran did. Raising his chin, he turned to face the being, though couldn’t lock his eyes anywhere. Once before, he could’ve sworn Pyrethrum was a human; a mask covered their face, now, pure white with black, tear-shaped holes cut out for “eyes”. So, he stared at those, trying to focus his vision as he spoke.

“I am the Purple Hyacinth,” he robotically said, having recited this speech a thousand times before. “I am a tool used for killing. I do not have emotions, because tools do not have emotions. I follow orders, and that is all.”

“Go on,” Pyrethrum edged, as if prodding him with a blade. Their tone of voice was sharp enough.

“Last week, I was sent on a mission to disband Lune. By doing so, I would kill Lauren Sinclair, an officer in the 11th precinct, and stalk her corpse until her partner came by. When they did, I would slaughter them, too.”

“Slaughter? That’s a new term,” the being barked, following it with a cruel laugh.

“They are animals. They are not humans, either, as I am not. They shield their identities behind masks and whimper when real danger is imminent. So, I slaughter them. Like the pigs they are.”

While he spoke, Kieran forced himself to remain still. His hands would be in his lap, his back straight, his eyes trying not to avert a gaze. Cold, he numbly thought. This room was cold, cold as it had ever been, but a strange chill filled it as he called the police “animals”. They were, and he’d been told it enough times. Strange enough, he found a small love in one of those animals, and couldn’t bring himself to kill it. Like one might hold back on killing a baby shepard, or hesitate bringing a knife down a calf’s neck. 

As if he had empathy.

Empathy? Adoration? Love, even? Platonic or romantic? Whatever the answer, Kieran didn’t know. His chest ached to think of Lauren as an animal, another pig to slaughter, another corpse to leave on the grill.

Blankly, “Continue.”

So, Kieran did. He took a deep breath, and continued. “I hesitated.” He froze, that time he saw Lauren’s horrified face, unable to bring himself to kill her. It had happened once before, he knew, but vaguely, he remembered. Those memories seemed to slip, now, as he spoke so carelessly.

“I couldn’t bring myself to kill Lauren.”

“Why?” Pyrethrum demanded, poison singing their tone.

“Perhaps I spent too much time with her, as a spy in her precinct. I saw her without her mask, and it was strange to me, to see someone without their mask. I wanted to know if she was truly a demon from the tales I’ve heard, or if she was simply another fat, wasting-away pig.”

“And was she?”

Kieran paused. He swallowed, tasting bileness in his spit, and finally, he managed out, “yes.”

Yes. A lie. A bitter, bitter lie.

If Lauren was here, with her ability to hear lies, she’d call him out. Brutally remark that he tried to slip a lie, and laugh about it, too, maybe. Thing is, she wasn’t. Lauren wasn’t, and Kieran sincerely hoped she’d never be.

Though their face was hidden behind a mask, Kieran could tell Pyrethrum was grinning. A hideous grin, splitting their face in half, tracing their teeth from one ear to another.

“One last chance, White,” the being declared. “After that, you know what’ll happen. I want to see her dead, and so does everyone else.”

Kieran stiffly nodded. “Yes, master. I’ll do as you command.”

“Good.”

That was three nights ago, when Kieran lucked out. He returned to the precinct, to work, relatively early. Hell, he was trying to talk to Lauren, to share his conversation, but she refused otherwise. 

Kieran stepped towards her; she kicked at her desk and spun around.

“Lauren — “ Kieran meekly called out.

“No.”

In that single syllable, those two letters, Kieran heard a tone of voice he’s always dreaded to hear from Lauren. From anyone, really, that he would always consider a human; hearing Pyrethrum’s dreadful voice speaking through Lauren, as if they’d possessed her.

“Lauren, please — “

Again, “no.”

“Please, if you just give me a minute — “

Lauren swung her chair over, drawing up a binder. She pointed a corner towards Kieran, as if it were a sword, and gave a cold glare. “One minute,” she said. “I’ll be counting. Timer starts now.”

Trying to speak quickly and coherently at the same time, Kieran sputtered out a mess of words. They were coughed up from his chest, things he held back before. At the end of it, as Lauren raised her fingers, silently counting down to five, Kieran fell back into a chair.

“I made a promise,” Kieran muttered, just barely loud enough to be heard. Bringing his hand over his chest, he simply stared back up to the ceiling. No more looking at Lauren. He didn’t deserve to. “I’ll keep it.”

“Explain last night.”

A pause, a hesitation. How could Kieran? To say that he was a traitor, a bastard, a fool…

“I can’t.”

“Figures. I don’t want you in my sight. Go.”

So, Kieran did.

That night, he sulked to his apartment, and spent several hours there. Contemplating, wondering, with a heart that was pounding in his chest. On one hand, he didn’t want to die, not yet, not before he could tell Lauren everything. On the other, he promised her. He promised to keep her safe, to keep Kym and Will safe. Not to try and kill her.

Anxious and paranoid, Kieran stood in front of his apartment door. The moment he stepped foot out, he’d have to return to that room. That chamber. The place that felt so, so horribly cold, freezing his blood and frosting his bones. A place where he had to take off his comfort clothes and wear paper-thin cloth, to stare at humanoid beings that certainly weren’t human. A place that he’d grown up all his life, and returned to like a spider to its web. Otherwise, he’d suffer consequences worse than he could ever imagine.

But for now, he just had to keep Lauren safe.

Somehow.

She might still be a target, Kieran argued to himself. Get her to flee, to run, to escape while she can. Sure, it was a surrender, but she’d keep her head, both literally and metaphorically. Insanity from running all the time would be a better fate than whatever the Phantom Scythe had up its sleeve.

If she was lucky, she’d suffer like Harvey did — to golden viper venom. Then, she’d die to end it all. If not….

Kieran shook his head, gritting his teeth. No, stop thinking like that. You’ll jinx it. Just go. Move. Do something, before it’s too late.

His feet slowly carried him along, dragging him through the night.

That night, two nights ago, Kieran had been punished greatly for failing again. He was strapped to a chair, chained up, an all-too-familiar mask tied to his face. He couldn’t scream, and even if he did, he’d likely suffer more.

Memories of what had happened before, when he endured the same pain, flashed through his mind in between gasps. Kieran couldn’t move, couldn’t beg for help. Couldn’t cry, even, as tears were torn from his face and burned his eyes. Water rushed through his lungs, a blazing, burning fire rather than comfort. It pummeled his head, coursed through his brain. 

All he was aware of, in those moments, was how much it burned. The same fire that was in Lauren’s silent rage was trying to skin him, peeling at his flesh and bones. Digging for his soul, trying to find it. It laughed, too, as it curled inside his stomach. Laughed, at the thought Kieran ever had a soul in the first place.

His heart churned in his chest. Something whipped at it with knives, every serrated slash forcing more and more blood. His dark-red vision would flash to semi-clearness, and he’d gasp, choke. Cough out that bleeding heart, all that blood dripping down his body and torn-away clothes. Cough out the water that swam in his stomach.

And again, it’d all repeat.

His entire life and existence would flash before his eyes, a blank thing that was as bloody and bruised as his thrashing arms. He kicked at the darkness, as if kicking would help. Tried to get free. Somehow, someway, freedom would be there. His betraying mind insisted that he’d be safe, too, like Lauren would be, if he breathed.

Breathing was a painful gamble. Sometimes, he’d instead choke and sputter on the same water he’d choked and sputtered on. Other times, the water was drier. How deliriously humorous. 

He lied to himself, lied to Lauren, and broke every promise. Shattered everything he’d ever put faith into.

Again, the tears, tears that didn’t learn their lesson, were torn from his eyes. Ripped from his eyeballs, things that were already bouncing in his skull.

When it was all over, Kieran hadn’t realized he was freed. He was only aware of still being on fire, of still burning. Burning in hell, his broken mind thought. Suffering for all the things he’d done. All those sins. Atoning for the crimes.

Luckily for him, Kieran wasn’t beat until his bones snapped. Instead, he was left to rot on the ground, soaking wet and icy cold. Shivering, he only laid there, curled up into a huddled ball. Wondering if he should risk the pain to simply cry.

Finally, just last night, Kieran was picked up again. He wasn’t punished for simply being incompetent, but because he let himself be victimized by emotions. Overwhelmed by that “human” inside of him, and so, Pyrethrum returned. They grabbed him by the hair, yanking at the limp body, and moved their hands to wrap around their neck.

“Shall I drag you or will you drag yourself?” they snarled. Silently, Kieran picked himself up, his entire body still shaking. The first step, he stumbled and fell, his knees buckling beneath unused weight. “Get up.”

So he did.

“I’m going to leave you alone for three days. You’re going to think about what you’ve done. You’re going to go back, and you’re going to continue to do as I order. Do you understand?”

Kieran merely nodded.

“If you scream, another day is added. I’ll get someone to force feed you twice a day.”

Another empty, dark room. This time, there were no windows. Up against the back wall, a single chair, just like all the other chairs Kieran had seen. There was something special about this one, though. A stench of blood and death, a rank sight of carnage that’d appear whenever it was nearby. 

Of course, Kieran didn’t want to go inside. His heart pained, every beat of it trying to break free of his ribcage, screaming, no, let me out. Even then, he had no choice but to; Pyrethrum shoved Kieran, pushed him inside, tied him to the chair, and left him there.

An hour passed. Two. Silence, dead silence, except for the steady, slow, drips of nearby water. They were hollow drips, empty drips, and a sound that Kieran held onto. They echoed in his ears, and that let him know he could still hear. Better than ever, with his eyes dead and a darkness replacing his vision.

Three hours passed, and that drip of water plopped over Kieran’s head. He nearly made a mistake and shouted, frantic and paranoid. What a mistake that would’ve been. Craning his head, Kieran tried to look up; a rope around it, unfortunately, kept him from moving. Plop. Another drop.

Those two stray drops began to drip into a steady flow, cold and colder. Kieran shivered, trembling all over again at the feel. That steady flow remained it’s constant stream, on his head, ebbing away at his skull. He heard it in his semi-coherent thoughts, heard it’s muted roaring. A coursing river that broke through a mountain’s rocky surface, but it was muffled. Quiet.

All at once, it was the loudest thing Kieran heard.

Kieran White sat there, silent, his back burning and his spine on the brink of snapping. He thought, and boy did he have time to think; 24-hours a day, he thought, those thoughts often dark, but some were reminiscing. Reminding. 

It wasn’t the first time he was in this damned situation.

Hell, Kieran’s first memories included him being in this situation. The vagueness of family, of those scowling silhouettes with carved faces, used to surround him. They mocked and laughed, ridiculed and sneered, kicking at him and wishing him dead. Parents that had abandoned him, put a monetary value on his head, and stuffed him into their deep pockets. Parents that only saw him as another profit.

Something pulled him out of that deep pocket, with sharp claws and ill will. Its claws tore through his skin, and from that point on, Kieran had a new life. Not at all the dreamy life of riding away on a pristine, marble-white horse, not at all a storybook of children’s fairy tales. One of pain, of torture, of darkness, of crippling fears to water and people.

Kieran was with other screaming children, those sobbing and begging to return to their parents. He didn’t understand them, and wished he never would. Unlike them, he partially accepted his fate; his mother had abandoned him, so he would abandon her. Simple as that, even if it made his tears swell and had him rocking back-and-forth. Of them, he was the first to be put in light.

A light that revealed how much blood was everywhere. His first mission was to kill, he recalled that, but not a human. An animal, a pig of all things, squealing as it trampled around in its own filth and shit.

“Kill it,” Pyrethrum said, their voice as stone and stoic as it would ever be. Kieran hesitated; he couldn’t, but he was forced to. His arm was taken and his hand grabbed, and even as he tried to resist and withdraw, his knife plunged into the squealing pig’s back. It screeched and cried, wailed and yawped. It continued, louder and pained, as Kieran’s knife dragged along its body, spewing out guts and blood.

It continued, even after it died, as Kieran sat alone, huddled up with his head in his legs and rocking back-and-forth. As he was haunted by pigs, stupidly enough; but at the time, he didn’t know they were hellish boars. With tusks and fangs, their squeals now roars, he didn’t realize they weren’t the same as that tortured, muddled pig. 

Still, it tormented him.

The second mission was long after, when Kieran had been pressured to learn. He picked up a sword, its long blade glimmering in the light, and swung it. Though he was suggested a knife, or even a gun, he wanted the sword. It was aesthetically pleasing, and his first “toy”. 

Kieran was much older, now, no longer a foolish baby but a foolish toddler. He was whispered the same things over the same years, murmured to while he anxiously slept. Adults weren’t always bad, but the worst ones were often parents. Parents that abandoned their children without a second thought, that abused them. 

So, Kieran, who was only seventeen, was told to kill an abusive father.

It was for a good cause, Pyrethrum insisted. Kieran hadn’t killed a human before, but the more he listened to Pyrethrum talk, the more he realized he wasn’t going to. Not now, at least. The abusive father wasn’t a human, he couldn’t be.

“You’re doing the world a favor,” the being murmured, “you’re going to cleanse it of its horrific monsters.”

Monster. A term that was flung around, but kept for only the worst of the worst. A sexually abusive prostitute, or a father that beat his children black and blue and still beat them. He heard of the monstrous Tyrianna (or Tyrant-anna, as some called her) and her manipulation tactics, disposing of those that were of no more use. Those black figures that stood by Kieran’s feet as he slept on his back, hovering, their white eyes shaky and unfocused.

Monster.

They didn’t deserve the gift of life, because all they did was take it from others. Greedy things that stole. That’s why it was good to take a monster’s life back, to free the stolen and captured souls.

That’s why murdering them is good.

It’s why killing is excusable.

It has to be.

Kieran nodded idly to Pyrethrum’s ramblings, trying to smile, though his face was weak and he hadn’t really known what it was. Only that it was a soft gesture, an answer when Pyrethrum wanted it. 

“Good. You have two days. Go.”

That was a shaky night, that time. It was cold then, too cold for a youthful Kieran, but as he recalled it, it gave him warmth. Warmth was one thing he wouldn’t have these lonely days, shivering under icy water.

The house’s front door was locked, as was the back door. The window, however, was not, and could freely be pushed open, leaving a stumbling Kieran to a much easier break-in. After infiltrating the house, it wasn’t hard to find the father — collapsed on the living room couch, a belt was still in his hand. Two nearby children, curled up on the ground, barely asleep.

It wasn’t hard to kill. That very sight enraged Kieran, though minutely; he couldn’t believe it, staring momentarily. How? Why? Why?

The next moment, that man was dead. A sword plunged into his heart, swiftly cutting through his chest. His eyes went wild and he released an ear-splitting scream. Quickly enough, that scream turned to a gargle, and as he madly fought against a ghost, he died. Drowning on his own blood, as he often threatened his children would. Ironic.

Kill them fast. Keep them from screaming too much. Keep them from facing you, from seeing your eyes, and it’s a success.

Kieran returned back to Pyrethrum to report his kill, feeling somewhat proud of himself. His first purge. His first cleanse. A monumental achievement, honestly, and his first step to cleansing himself, too. To rid of his own emotions, as he rid the world of scum.

He remembered Pyrethrum’s toothy grin beneath that mask, the bemused chuckle of a being that hadn’t realized this would work. Their light claps, as one hand contacted another, applauding his success. The stale, cold, emotionless, “good job.”

Swift. That was Kieran’s specialty. He was fast, and he was stealthy. He went on more missions, outshining the other “competitors” he grew up with; in truth, he never saw them as competitors. He hardly saw them as humans. Just as Pyrethrum was, they all existed. Beings. Faceless, with masks, and without emotions. Just like him.

Right?

The next time Kieran killed, it was another abusive parent. He’d rid of all those monstrous beings, he promised himself. That thought stayed with him as he raised his sword and struck a woman who had been planning to sell her children; that thought stayed with him as he heard a child scream in horror. That thought stayed with him as those screams carried in his sleep and struck a nightmare. Nightmares where he burned in the hells he’d heard stories of, punished in the ways he read about.

If they couldn’t bother to raise their children, or even to love them, they didn’t deserve to live. They were only hurting others, permanently scarring them.

The third time, however, Kieran was beginning to have his head filled with stories. 

Stress often filled his heart, trying to push him to do better and better. When he couldn’t, or reached his limit, he was brutally punished. Whipping was common, but when Kieran was unable to walk or properly follow orders, they resorted to simple loneliness. Solitude. Locking him away, leaving him with his thoughts, and refusing all else.

Alone, Kieran could hear the screams, the sounds, the faces of monsters. Their cruel laughs, with melting faces to match it. Weeping, tortured children, just as he was tortured, but these children were begging to be hurt again. Begging for a mother that was gone, or a father that had whipped them day-in, day-out. Begging for the greedy bastards that sold their bodies, limbs, eyeballs, heartbeat, very breaths.

Somewhere along the line, that line of monster blurred. To Kieran, they were all still evil. Malicious. A reason behind the murder, a why to the murderer. He killed because he was told to, even if that shield of “it’s for the greater good” began to falter. Even as he was aware he stole parents from their children, or children from their parents, even as he struck a man he knew would be missed, he tried to hold onto it. All of this was good.

He was good.

If he wasn’t, and was killing innocents, then he, too, was a monster, and he couldn’t be. He wasn’t one. Not one of those things that stalked him in his sleep, not a sentient shadow that existed only to destroy and corrupt. 

“What would you do if you were… one of them?” another child had asked Kieran, chewing on a piece of cloth.

“Who is them?” Kieran had asked back.

“The things. The monsters.”

Kieran froze up at the word. It had been a long while since he heard that word aloud, but he wasn’t sure what he was expected. A chill in the air? A deep, hoarse echo?

“I’d have to kill myself, then,” Kieran had replied.

“But why?”

“I kill monsters.”

That was the end of that conversation.

As the line blurred, Kieran found that he killed a little bit of himself with every faceless monster. It seemed to be that the coursing river of blood he walked by eroded at his soul. Every step in that muddled bank would sink and squelch, causing the next to be heavier and heavier. 

Every murder. Every death. Corpses floated, belly-up, and he paid no attention to them.

It just so happened that Kieran returned to discover that his rustiness had forced him to look upon this pollution once more.

Caught in the dead of night. Fleeing another scene of murder, running through a window and out into the darkness. He was sloppy, that time around, unused again, and that sloppiness cost him everything.

An officer had caught up with him. No issue there; Kieran would have to kill them, if unable to outrun them. They were fast, maybe as fast as he, and refused to hold back. Fine. He ran, swung, ducked, kicked. Aimed for anything but the chest, because that night, he didn’t want another murder on his hands. What if trying to clean it up was a hassle? Kieran was supposed to be back, now.

Not resorting to killing immediately made things harder. He was pinned against the ground, a gun to his head, and only grinned. It was a delirious feeling, to be caught. To, again, have someone threaten his death, but this was different. Pyrethrum had no care for a tool like him; he was, after all, a tool, and just that. Tools break, crack. Tools can be replaced. Tools are replaced, when they’re of no more use. Now, this officer, who was so brainwashed to protect every single damned citizen, cared. Kieran could tell, with its hesitation, with its shaky breath.

Wary he wasn’t playing with death, it was easy to flip the circumstances. He stood, knocked the gun away, and kicked.

His foot came to that officer’s temple, grazing its face rather than knocking it out. It staggered back, mask torn away, and Kieran found a perfect opening. Drawing his sword, he found he no longer wanted to save its life. 

Still, though, as his mind pressed to murder, Kieran froze.

A fully-faced being.

He hadn’t seen one before, and if he had, he couldn’t remember.

Eyes. They existed. They were real, they weren’t fake holes carved into a fake mask. They were real, very real, and so were irises; this officer had golden irises, bright and yellow, like a sunlight’s refraction through stained glass. And these irises, right now, were quivering. Trembling. 

Staring right at him, trying to find his soul, peering into every sin he’d ever committed, and with fear. Horrible, horrible fear, that Kieran hadn’t seen in so long.

That moment’s hesitation ripped Kieran’s want away.

No longer did the want to kill exist. He pulled back, sword back in its sheath, and fled. A human. They existed, and outside of his storytime tales, outside of the pictures in drawings he mimicked. That girl. Who was she? Why did a girl, a woman, a female human who could have a soul, stay in a corrupt place like the police department?

Why would someone sell their life like that?

Running away, Kieran escaped back into the night, holding the darkness as a cloak. His body quaked as if he were thrown into a basin of cold water, and for all he could’ve known, he very well might have been. A human.

A face.

Kieran kept that image of a face in his mind for the following days. He remembered it when he idly reported his kills, walked the lonely streets home, opened the door to his apartment, and sat at his desk. He remembered it just like many others, but this time, it had features.

It was a mythical thing, nonexistent. Something he hardly believed, like the snaking dragons that swam through the skies, or the miniature-humans with tiny, butterfly wings. Kieran had seen some before, surely, but the ones in reality always bled and screamed. If his monstrous victims had faces, they’d eat at his flesh and chew at his bones.

He drew it, over and over, trying to capture the light once again. That shaking fear. His hand sketched, his finger guided over the paper. That shaking fear…

It (she?) was afraid of death. 

Did the monsters fear death, too?

Was it only a human thing, for mortals that didn’t hide in a puppet of skin and flesh? For mortals that, maybe, were born in the first place, and knew that they had an inevitable death.

So many questions, none that would ever be answered.

Kieran reconciled on all those wondering, curious thoughts. Even now, as he remembered Lauren’s face, remembered how she was so terrified back then, he realized he’d see one worse. When he tried to kill her, recently, they were worse. Horrified, aghast. Wide-open, with realization that Kieran was a monster, too, just like all the ones he killed. Thinking that she’d die, and all at once, coming to the terms that she would.

But, in the end, Kieran couldn’t. Just like that night, so many days ago. He couldn’t kill someone that wasn’t a monster.

He couldn’t kill a human.

He was supposed to protect them.

Protection…

Kieran shook his head, looking as high up as he possibly could. His eyes were immensely unfocused, and it became hard to tell if he was in some kind of delusion, daydream, or even dead. Post-mortem suffering seemed to be what was happening, with that steady drizzle drilling into his skull.

He drew some cold breaths, and tried to smile. Lauren’s smile. It was beautiful, the way her eyes were, the soft tug at her lips. When she blushed, too, and that light pink flushed her cheeks. Or the flourishing emotions that stirred in her, when she had to defend Dylan.

“She’s a monster, too,” Kieran mumbled to himself, his head lolled to the side. “She’s selfish, and cares only for herself. When it came down to it, all she cared about was Dylan, and trying to avenge him. Even there, though, it was for herself. To cure her guilt.”

Kieran laughed meekly, all alone in that echoing cell. He heard his own laugh in his ears, every repetition becoming colder, eviller. 

“Maybe every human has a little monster inside of them.”

Did that mean Kieran, too, could be a human? Just a little?

“No, you’ll never be one. Not like Lauren.”

Lauren wasn’t all too human, though. She had selfish desires, cruel wants. She kept Kieran alive, and didn’t sentence him to death. How could a human keep someone like Kieran free, roaming the streets, knowing his identity?

“But she has a face. She’s a human.”

Considering all that, honestly, Kieran couldn’t help but feel as if… he still couldn’t kill Lauren. She wasn’t a monster, as much as he wanted to believe that. She wasn’t a cruel, torturing human being, who stole lives from others and drank from their bleeding wounds. He, on the other hand, was.

And so, those thoughts stayed in Kieran’s mind for all of four days. On the third, he began maniacally laughing, screaming as those internal arguments became external. He thrashed and fought, and tried so hard to be free, but instead, it only damned him further. 

When the fourth day came, Pyrethrum held handcuffs and chains. They whacked Kieran against the head, palm to the back of his skull, and scowled as they always had. “Get up.”

Chains loosened from Kieran’s limbs, but he couldn’t really stand. Nor could he feel anything. Every step was a stumble, his frail, unused legs twigs that could easily fracture. Still, Pyrethrum forced Kieran to walk, muttering into his ears all the way.

“Move faster”, “stop fumbling with your feet”, “I have someone you’d like to see.”

Kieran perked up at those last words.

“I see I’ve gotten your attention.”

“Who?” he croaked, his voice broken and cracked.

“Do you remember a certain Lauren Sinclair?”

No.

No, no, no.

Lauren.

Kieran didn’t talk. If he did, he feared he might turn those weak words into ones of shouting anger. A human.

“She was like that, too, when she heard she’d get to see you one last time. Don’t worry, I’ll let you spend time with your fiance. I’m not evil, Kieran. I’ll give you alone time, too, and if you get tired of her, you can simply kill her yourself. One last day, before she dies, but there’s a catch: you don’t know when she’ll die.”

That was better than nothing.

“Feel free to discuss whatever you want with her. You’re the last person she’ll ever see.”

Unlike Kieran, Lauren wasn’t in chains. She was sitting in a chair, yes, but somewhat freer. Her clothes had changed to something that looked like a mock-up police uniform. Her gaze was stiff, and she looked over at Kieran with a mix of disapproval, fear, and surprise.

“You,” Lauren said thickly.

“Me,” Kieran repeated hoarsely.

“Lovebirds,” Pyrethrum trilled in a dead, monotone voice. “Go on. Be free. Do as you wish. There’s a beach you both can go to, feel free to drown one another there.”

Kieran kept looking at Lauren, but she instead bared her teeth. Lowering his gaze to the ground, he heard Pyrethrum’s fading steps.

“While I was being dragged against my will here,” Lauren said, her voice heavy and loud, “I saw… something like a church. I want you to cleanse me of my sins and my mistakes before you slit my throat.”

“I — “

“It’s the least you can do, Kieran.”

He did, eventually. It felt strange, to be walking while knowing Lauren could die at any second. A snake seemed to be spying on him, hissing into his ears, slithering around his neck and strangling him. Whenever Lauren doubled down, coughing harshly and hugging herself, she demanded Kieran stand back.

“Don’t you dare lay a hand on me,” Lauren Sinclair gasped between coughs. Kieran didn’t; he stood back, ashamed and guilt-ridden. Regardless, he didn’t think he could’ve helped — he could barely even walk. It took all his stamina to keep his head up, and to keep following Lauren. Empty streets, yet smoke fumed from chimneys. This place was partially abandoned..

The church Lauren mentioned was mostly run-down, with cracked bricks and stone. Disregarding that, the ceiling was oddly intact, with no crevices or gaps. Inside, there was only one room, long and straight, with a pool contained. Surprisingly, this place was relatively clean — other than small amounts of weeds and moss that stuck from spare puddles. Vines grew against the walls, shying away from shadows and where the sun sprinkled in. The pool by itself was as it was: a rectangle carved into the ground, with glistening, pale-blue water on its surface. A gentle rush of water burst at certain spots in the sides, places that looked to be filters. 

“All I consent to is for you to wash my soul. Pour holy water over my head. You may not do anything else.”

“Alright.”

Lauren paused, unmoving for a moment. She glanced around, setting her eyes on a large, clay jar. “On second thought, maybe no holy water.”

The next moment Kieran really processed was trying to dump water over someone’s head when he couldn’t look at them. Sunlight sparkled over the surface in the water, blinding him enough when he tried to look at it. Despite the soreness in his arms and the creak in his joints, he still held a jar and doused Lauren with water.

“It’s oddly warm,” Lauren mumbled. Fully clothed, she was kneeling in the pool, her head poking free. “Wonder if it’s been cooking?”

She spent the time mumbling to herself, maybe reminiscing the past. If so, Kieran had no doubts he was the last person she desired to be by. Dylan, maybe, or even her other two fiends, Will and Kym. Not the man who twice, though failed, tried to kill her.

Part of the reason why Kieran couldn’t look at Lauren was the selfish reminder of himself. It was a steady trickle of water from that clay jar, just like the steady trickle that fell over his head for four days. Still, his vision was blurry from that time, and he just couldn’t get it out of his head. Drip, drip, drip. 

“Kieran,” Lauren abruptly said.

“Sorry,” Kieran followed up quickly. “I got distracted.”

“No, that’s not it.”

“Hmm?”

“Why are you all mangled up?”

“Mangled up?” he immediately countered.

“Don’t dodge the question. You know what I mean.”

Setting down the jar, Kieran took a seat on the ground, crisscrossing his legs. Oh, where to begin… How to begin, really. But would he really want to put such a heavy burden on a dying human’s shoulders? “I kept my promise,” he finally settled on.

“Ha. Doubtful. You had a sword to my neck.”

“I didn’t draw blood. You’re not dead. Nor are Kym or Will. Everyone important to you is alive, and everyone who’s hurt you will die.”

“Ha! You speak coldly. How is being one second away from murdering me, protecting me? How do you plan to kill everyone who’s hurt me?”

“They’ll die,” Kieran reassured, confidently and stupidly. “That’s how mortality works. Whether by force or by nature.”

“How thoughtful, subordinate. I didn’t realize you were capable of emotions.”

Neither did I, Kieran numbly thought.

When a silence befell the two, Kieran counted his heartbeats. One, two, three, four. Nothing else to do. He wanted to speak and to explain, maybe to vent, but was afraid he’d ramble on and curse Lauren even more. Already, his own existence had hurt her, and his relationship had gotten her killed.

“Talk, you moron.”

“What?”

“If you wanna talk, just talk. It’s not like I’ll live to tell anyone else about it, anyway.”

Truth be told, Lauren shouldn’t have said that. If she hadn’t, Kieran wouldn’t begin to blubber on about his life. If she hadn’t, Kieran wouldn’t have spoken about the reasons he killed, the reasons he was in the Phantom Scythe, the reasons for everything. All the answers, but not at all the ones Lauren wanted: just the ones about… his past.

By the end of it, Lauren had stopped responding. She made little quips or remarks along the way, words that were too faint to be properly heard. Kieran moved closer to her, hesitant if he was too close, and softly whispered, “are you alive?”

And barely, barely, Lauren’s ghostly voice whispered back; “I forgive you, Kieran. Thank you.” A pause, skipping four heartbeats, as Kieran waited in intense, burning silence. Her hand raised slightly in the water, just enough that Kieran could hold it. “I love you, too.”

Kieran wanted to scream, or maybe to shout. To argue and protest and maybe sob about how unfair life was. He couldn’t, and just stared, feeling the already-little strength leaves Lauren’s grip. Her feathers touch that matched her feathery breath. 

Long hours passed, and still, Kieran held a corpse’s hand. He wasn’t able to do anything, other than to lay there, looking at her resting face and closed eyes. Peace. She was at peace. The only human he’d ever known, the only being with empathy and emotions and a genuine reason to exist, and she was dead. Dead, by his own hands, by his own fault. By his own mistakes.

I’m sorry, Kieran wanted to murmur, but he already heard her last words. Accepting his apology, already, when he ranted on in self-pity. Maybe she refused to die until she understood him, the monster that he was, the demon that replaced his soul, and when she got that answer, no longer did she try. Fighting became useless and unnecessary. Wants and desires were satisfied. Maybe, Kieran greedily thought, if he held back, he could see her smile once more. Delayed her death. 

Just a minute more’s all I want, Kieran sadly thought. He didn’t deserve it, not even a glimpse at her in the afterlife, for all the years he burned away. But, he still wanted it. A minute more. One last smile, or laugh, or cheerfulness in her face. Not to spend their last days with her bitter and scowling and her angry at him.

This was just how fate played out, and fate was cruel.

When the day came to a final end, Kieran was forcibly taken away. Pyrethrum themselves came to see the remainder of the two, picking Kieran up by the leg and dragging him away.

“Give her a funeral, at least,” Kieran argued.

“Fine. I want you to do something in exchange for me, though.”

“What is it?”

“I have a list of monsters I need dead.”

There it was again. Monsters. 

“You called Lauren one of them, didn’t you? How do I know you’re not sending me to kill another innocent human?”

“Challenging me? If your memory wasn’t disgustingly incorrect, you’d know I never did call her a monster. Merely an obstruction, part of Lune. Never did I call her one.”

Kieran did, eventually. He followed the list and it’s names, striking every person dead without even a second’s hesitation. Only once did he stop, and it was in the late of night, standing by the bridge where both he and Lauren met to sign a deal. Maybe he was bad, horridly bad, for cherishing Lauren’s life more than others. For thinking one was better than many.

But it was, he internally debated. They were monsters being taken in exchange for the remembrance of a human.

And he stayed with that stance the day he stood by Lauren’s grave, leaving a purple hyacinth atop the patted dirt. There was a rain, but it didn’t soak him to his bone — if he did, he’d hate fate and the gods even more. All that rained was his sadness, the tears that he did his best to hide. 

Pyrethrum patted Kieran on the head; “time to go, now, you can stand here another day.”

The screams haunted Kieran nonstop. When he walked by graves, skeletal hands shot up to grab at his ankle. Skeletons tried to pull him to beneath the lands, into the fiery pits of hell, laughing all the way. Blood seemed to pour from wounds he didn’t really have, but the cuts he inflicted on others. They were mirrored onto him, his limbs, trickled from his neck and wrists.

Lauren might’ve accepted his apology, but what of the others?

“I said everyone that ever hurt you will die,” Kieran mumbled to himself one, lonely day. Now, he sat at that church, his legs in the water. Lauren died here. This was a dead human’s final resting spot. “So, I must, too.”

Grimly, he stood, and walked away.

Monster.

That word pounded his skull and echoed in his mind. 

“I can’t believe I thought, for even a second, you were human! You’re nothing but a monster!”

Monster.

“Ha,” Kieran said aloud, clutching his head. Dear god did it hurt, burning at his eye sockets, replacing any empty space in his skull with lava. “You are one, and your job is to kill them. How ironic.”

It takes one to know one. It takes one to understand that others of them exist, and that others of them must die. In order to protect the faithful, weak, innocent humans, people that have yet to be corrupted by monstrous nature.

“The least I could do is try to take one more monster out of this world, right?”

While the thoughts plagued Kieran’s mind, Pyrethrum was thinking, contemplating his choices. 

They knew well when a tool was coming to its breaking point, and that Kieran White, the legendary Purple Hyacinth, was coming to its snapping point. How much longer would they be able to use this weapon until it broke in their hands? Snapped, and left them with a splinter? A blister? A cut? Or even went out on its own nature, and killed others without orders? A dog that refused to heed command was a dog to be put down.

Perhaps it was cruel to cut Kieren while he thrashed in his nightmares. It only drove him further to insanity. Or, to whisper in his ears while he ate; to leave blood on his hands whenever he tried to fall asleep.

So, when Pyrethrum found Kieran’s body, drowned in the bloody pool of water Lauren had died in, they understood it was worth burying a dead dog. 

It was amusing to them that Kieran hadn’t died by drowning, even when he tied himself down. No, it was by cuts — dozens of them, all over his skin, cutting deep into his flesh. Some formed words, such as sorry, or please. Both were the most common. Others formed Lauren, hopeless, and monster. He bled to death, according to the autopsy. Regardless, it likely didn’t help that all the bacteria-filled water had gotten into his wounds. Possibly, it made them worse.

Still, wary that Pyrethrum was the one to drive their once-obedient dog to biting every passerby, he felt pity. Sorrow, somber that they had to put him down. They left Kieran’s grave by Lauren’s, a daisy atop it just as a purple hyacinth was atop hers.

They leaned down, to the dirt they just put over a casket. 

Whispering to the dirt, as if the corpse could hear, they said, “you’re forgiven.”


End file.
